Reports of sexual offences and cases going to the courts continue to rise this year.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions states that there were a total of 231 people charged with a total of 522 separate counts of serious sexual offences from May 2016 to May this year.
16 people charged with serious sexual offences during this period are under the age of 18 years.
The DPP’s Office confirms that there were 384 cases of rape, 10 cases of attempted rape, 8 cases of assault with intent to rape, 3 cases of abduction with an intent to rape, 12 cases of indecent assault, 5 cases of incest, 6 defilement cases and 94 sexual assault cases.
151 victims were under the age of 18 years.
To date, the youngest victims of serious sexual offences are 1 year 10 months and 1 year 11 months old and the accused persons were the father and grandfather of the victims.
There were 86 offences that occurred in domestic relationships or where the accused was known to the victims.
Additionally, there were charges of unlawful wounding, criminal trespass as part of the act of rape and indecently annoying a female.
According to the statistics, there were 29 rape cases in May last year compared to 51 rape cases in May this year.
There were 46 serious sexual offences in May 2016 compared to 71 in May, 2017.
